Benchmark: JSON.stringify vs structuredClone1

Script Preparation code:

var MyObject = {
  description: 'Creates a deep copy of source, which should be an object or an array.',
  myNumber: 123456789,
  myBoolean: undefined,
  jayson: {
    stringify: 'JSON.stringify() method converts a JavaScript value to a JSON string....',
    parse: 'JSON.parse() method parses a JSON string...'
  }
};

var myCopy = null;

Tests:

JSON.stringify
myCopy = JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(MyObject)); console.log(myCopy)
structuredClone
myCopy = structuredClone(MyObject); console.log(myCopy)

Rendered benchmark preparation results:

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Previous results

Test case name	Result
JSON.stringify
structuredClone

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Latest run results:

Run details: (Test run date: 2 years ago)

User agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/123.0.0.0 Safari/537.36

Browser/OS: Chrome 123 on Windows

View result in a separate tab

Test name	Executions per second
JSON.stringify	174648.7 Ops/sec
structuredClone	136403.3 Ops/sec

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model llama3.2:3b, generated one year ago):

LLMs can make mistakes. Check important info.

I'll break down the provided benchmark definition and test cases to explain what's being tested, the options compared, their pros and cons, and other considerations.

**Benchmark Definition:**

The JSON object represents two benchmark definitions:

1. `JSON.stringify vs structuredClone1`
2. The first benchmark definition contains a script preparation code that creates an object `MyObject` with various properties, including a nested object `jayson`. It also initializes a variable `myCopy` to `null`.
3. The second benchmark definition is similar to the first one but uses `structuredClone(MyObject)` instead of `JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(MyObject))`.

**Options Compared:**

Two options are being compared:

1. **JSON.stringify()**: A built-in JavaScript method that converts a JavaScript value to a JSON string.
2. **structuredClone()**: A newer JavaScript method introduced in ECMAScript 2020, designed for deep copying objects while preserving their structure and relationships.

**Pros and Cons:**

1. **JSON.stringify():**
	* Pros:
		+ Wide browser support (since 2009)
		+ Easy to implement
	* Cons:
		+ Creates a shallow copy by default (not suitable for nested objects with cyclic references)
		+ Can be slower than `structuredClone()` due to the overhead of serializing and parsing JSON strings
2. **structuredClone():**
	* Pros:
		+ Designed specifically for deep copying, handling nested objects with cyclic references
		+ Generally faster than `JSON.stringify()`
	* Cons:
		+ Requires modern browsers that support ECMAScript 2020 ( introduced in Chrome 90 and later)
		+ May not be supported by older browsers

**Library Usage:**

There is no explicit library mentioned in the benchmark definition. However, it's worth noting that `structuredClone()` is a part of the JavaScript standard library since ECMAScript 2020.

**Special JS Features or Syntax:**

None are explicitly used in this benchmark. The tests rely on built-in JavaScript methods and variables.

**Other Considerations:**

* **Memory usage:** Both options can lead to memory issues if the original object has a large number of properties or references. `structuredClone()` might be more efficient in terms of memory allocation, but it's still subject to browser limitations.
* **Browser quirks:** Different browsers may exhibit varying performance differences between these two methods.

**Alternatives:**

If you're interested in exploring alternative approaches for deep copying JavaScript objects, consider:

1. Using a dedicated library like Lodash or Underscore.js, which provide functions for recursive object cloning (e.g., `lodash.clone()`).
2. Implementing your own recursive function to copy nested objects.
3. Utilizing other libraries or frameworks that offer built-in support for deep copying, such as React's `useCallback` and `useMemo`.

Related benchmarks:

JSON.stringify vs structuredClone1 (version: 0)

JSON.stringify vs structuredClone

Comparing performance of: JSON.stringify vs structuredClone

Created: 2 years ago by: Guest

Jump to the latest result

JSON.stringify

structuredClone

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model llama3.2:3b, generated one year ago):